Imagine you are building a house. The first and most important step is to start with a strong foundation. A good foundation will support the structure of the house; a bad foundation will cause endless problems with the stability of the structure. The same thing applies to our own foundations. If we do not have a healthy strong foundation, everything that we try to build on top of it is going to topple down.

Self-Esteem, Self-Confidence, and Self-Image make up the foundation of self. Low self-esteem, lack of self-confidence or negative self-image can weaken and destroy our foundation. A fragile foundation hinders self-improvement and goal obtainment because as we try and try we see our efforts collapse. The connection between the amount of success that we see in our lives is in proportion to how healthy or unhealthy our sense of self is.

Self- Esteem is the sense of one’s worth or value. It is the opinion or judgment of yourself and the measure of self-respect and pride that you have for yourself. People that have low self-esteem do not hold themselves a high regard. They are often people pleasers that neglect their own needs for the needs of others. Low self-esteem prevents a person from accomplishing goals in their lives because on either a conscious or an subconscious level they do not really believe they are worthy. Individuals that have low self-esteem might engage in acts of self-sabotage to make their belief that they are not worthy of success a reality, not only in their own minds, but in their physical reality as well.

Self-confidence is the belief in yourself and your abilities. Low self-confidence often keeps people from going after their goals because they do not believe they have the skills or abilities to succeed. This often creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, if you don’t think you can then you won’t, no matter what steps you employ. Lack of belief in your abilities will prevent most people from even attempting to go after their goals or to give up too quickly.

Self-Image is the overall concept or metal image of yourself and your assessment of your qualities. This is simply what you think of yourself, do you consider yourself as a good person or a bad person. How do you define yourself? When you think about your traits do only see the bad? How do you describe yourself to others? These are all questions to consider when figuring out if your self-image is positive or negative. An unhealthy self-image impacts your overall feelings of worth which inhibits self-improvement and growth.

These three foundation blocks are interconnected. A low self-esteem is usually going to result in low self-confidence and poor self-image. In turn, having a negative self-image contributes to your low self-esteem and lack of self-confidence. The three work together to form the foundation of self, a trouble in one area leads to issues in the remaining two; making the urgency to work on the areas that need improvement even more critical.

The best way to keep your foundation strong is to first and foremost realize your worth, know that you are a good person and that you deserve success in your life. If you really do not believe that, you start with changing the way you think. Daily affirmations are an effective way to change negative thoughts connected with your image, esteem, and confidence. By telling yourself positives, you are through repetition retraining yourself to think differently about yourself.

Changing the way that you talk to yourself is another way to strengthen your foundation. Most people with low sense of self, engage in negative self talk and are very critical of themselves. Being aware of how you talk to yourself and making the switch from negative to positive can really change the way you think and feel about yourself. It also improves the relationship that you have with yourself, promoting self-love and better insights into yourself.

By thinking of yourself as being worthy and deserving of success in all areas of your life, you are removing limiting thinking. Our thoughts help create the realities in our lives. By believing in yourself, you are creating and maintaining the healthy sense of self that is going to help you flourish.

The first step is to take action. It is important not to keep yourself from falling down into a black hole, resulting in feelings of hopelessness and despair. Evaluate your esteem, confidence, and image. Start implementing ways to improve them, one step at a time. If you do not think that you can do it on your own, then seek help! There is no shame in asking for help, the shame is depriving yourself of a life of prosperity and success.

By: Tonya Ramsey

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“People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy after.” Goldsmith

The subject of my note today is Self Improvement. In discussing this subject I’d love to look at the word KAIZEN. Kaizen is a Japanese management term referring to constant, continuous and never-ending improvement. Anthony Robbins calls this concept CANI that stands for: “Constant And Never Ending Improvement.” Kaizen is a way of life. It is constant improvement in every aspect of your life. You have a built-in mechanism to grow and to improve. Therefore, ascertaining how to improve your relationship, your knowledge, your attitude, your goals and goal-setting strategies, leadership skills and time management should be your daily responsibility. Experts in the field of human development say that everything can be improved on by at least ten per cent.

There is no pursuit more venerable than the pursuit of self-improvement. Self-improvement as aforementioned, begins with your born again spirit, your mind, as you consistently renew it with God’s word. Everything is capable of being improved, even if only incrementally. The concept of continuous improvement can literally be applied to every aspect of your personal and professional life. Consistent and constant pursuit of improvement in all areas of your life is indispensable in the attainment of your true potential. Hence improving daily, whether by spending some time exercising, reading, visualizing or forging better relationships, you are making regular deposits and evolving toward a desired attainable end.

The personal mark of almost every high achiever and successful people is a daily dedication to improvement in both personal and professional lives. To be effective, you have to do things daily and consistently and not haphazardly to advance congruently in the direction of your goals, ultimate purpose and destiny.

It is fundamental to apply the Kaizen or CANI principle on a consistent basis to every component of your life from spiritual to physical, business to family to attain peak performance as you migrate toward your desired end.

By: Richard Onebamoi

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If you are reading this article because you are motivated to self-improve, you have come to the right place. But first, do you know what you mean by “to improve yourself?”

It may well be that you yourself are not sure what you mean by Self-Improvement. Many who feel, deep down inside, that they want to improve themselves, are not sure what exactly they mean by it.

Does “Self-Improvement” mean:

* Becoming motivated to achieve more in life?
* Becoming more assertive?
* More open?
* Improving communication skills?
* Expanding dating capabilities?
* Becoming more tolerant?
* Increasing happiness?
* Making necessary changes?
* Becoming more spiritual?
* Learning to forgive?
* Increasing self-esteem?
* Developing positive thinking?

If you would have known what you mean by Self-Improvement, you would have gone directly to the path leading you to this specific improvement.

It may well be that you are not sure due to the fact that all these listed above – and many more – are related to one another; improving one can have a positive effect on the others – whether spiritually, emotionally, economically and psychologically.

Self-Awareness: the umbrella of self-improvement

Self-Awareness is the place where all the listed above mingle; it is the best available means to self-improvement: as you become aware of yourself, you’re more likely to know what in you and your life you’d like to change and improve. The process of developing Self-Awareness is, by itself, a process of self-improvement.

As you become aware, you improve yourself

Apparently, if you feel the need and desire to self-improve it means that:

* “Something” in you tells you that you are not living your life to the fullest;
* It is likely that in one way or another you are shooting yourself in the foot;
* You know you can have a better life if only…- and here you’re stuck: if only what?

This is what you might not know yet. And this is what developing Self-Awareness can help you realize.

When you develop awareness, get to know and understand yourself, you realize:

* The ways in which ways you have sabotaged your life;
* The factors which had power over you and drove you to harm your life;
* The steps you need to take in order to change.

The more self-aware you become, the more you get to know “who you really are” and in which ways you still want to self-improve.

By: Doron Gil, Ph.D.

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What is self improvement?

Self-improvement is a journey of changing yourself for the better. There are several different areas in life that make up the whole of your experience. Various people have come up with more or less aspects, but I think the following list is fairly comprehensive:

work

finances

family

social

mental

fun

emotional

spiritual

health

character

contribution

The whole idea of self-improvement is to work on developing a more positive attitude, better skills, and more supportive beliefs in each of these areas. Only you can really decide what each of these areas mean to you, and your definition and the importance you place on each area will continually change and evolve with you.

Why work on improving and developing yourself?

Would you rather be happy and broke, or rich and miserable? Ultimately, if most people really stop to think about it, they would rather be happy. We usually want to get that new item, or do or become something because we think it will make us happy. Material goods and social status only bring fleeting happiness. The new home or car or wardrobe will eventually lose the appeal it initially had and will fall into the routine of life. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not here to tell you that you should devote yourself to a life of poverty, what I’m getting at is that sustained happiness comes from the inside out. This is where developing yourself comes in. If you develop each area of your life it will help you become a happier, healthier person on a more sustained basis and you’ll eventually come to find that it’s possible to be both wealthy and happy.

If you understand that money and status don’t bring lasting happiness then it makes sense why there are so many areas listed above. How happy would you be if you’re financially secure, but you’re not healthy enough to enjoy it, or your relationships and family life are in ruins? All of these areas need at least some focus at all times. To be truly successful, all areas of your life need to be working well for you. The next few sections will give you some ideas on where to start. Future articles will deal with specifics on how to do it.

1. Start with your weakest area

Take some time and go through the listed areas of your life and rate them on a scale of one to ten, one being the worst and ten the best it could be. Your lowest scoring area will be where you need to put the most energy and focus. If your finances are your worst scoring area, then they should receive the most attention. Keep working on improving this area and periodically review and rescore yourself in the different aspects of your life. Once you’ve brought your finances up to a point where they are no longer your lowest scoring area, then you shift your focus over to your new lowest score.

One bonus is that you may find that by improving one area of your life, there will be some spill over of improvements in other areas of your life. Going back to the example of finances being your weakest area, let’s say you’ve begun working in this area and things are starting to improve for you. You may start to see your social life, family life, emotional health and physical health improving as well. More money will allow you the resources to do more social activities, there will be less monetary stress within your family and you’ll be under less stress due to financial difficulties which will improve both your emotional and physical health.

2. Start with your physical health

Physical health affects all areas of your life so this may be a good area to start. If you’re in better shape and better health physically, the benefits are tremendous. You’ll have more energy available to work on your financial situation, do social activities, have fun, do things with the family. Improved physical health also benefits your emotional health due to the chemicals that exercise and proper nutrition releases in your body. It will also benefit you mentally and improve your ability to think and focus. It could help you socially because you’ll look better and have more self-confidence. You’ll develop the habits of setting goals and being disciplined which are habits that can help you in all areas of life. And it will likely extend your lifespan and help reduce your chances of getting ill. Overall, the benefits of better physical health are hard to beat.

3. Face your fears

If you want to see some dramatic changes in your life fairly quickly, face your fears one by one. Determine what your greatest fear is and face it. As you start progressing at overcoming your fears you’ll develop a huge sense of accomplishment and your self-confidence will grow as well. Fear is usually what keeps us stuck in certain areas of our life. As you overcome your fears, you’ll start to see yourself move forward again.

Conclusion

Please keep in mind that making changes in your life is rarely something that happens overnight. You need to look at this as a long-term investment in yourself. Many readers are probably thinking that this whole idea of self-improvement seems like it would be to much work. You’re certainly welcome to think this way and keep doing what you’ve been doing. But before you do, take a look back to the last five years of your life. Did you enjoy them? Were you as happy as you would have liked? Would you do them over again without changing a thing? If you answered ‘no’ to any of those questions, then you need to seriously consider making some changes. Unless you start changing things now, the next five years won’t be any different than the last five. The time is going to pass either way, so why not make good use of it? You’ll be glad you did.

By: Colin Vandermeulen

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DVDs are a powerful tool. They are not only just for watching movies, but can also be used for self improvement as well. In the privacy of your own home, you can study and enhance whatever phobia or anxiety needs working on.

Self Improvement DVDs: Hypnotherapy for Confidence

Having faith in your own abilities is the key to the power of this DVD. Being able to overcome all sorts of social anxieties, shyness, and social phobias are the basics touched upon in the Hypnotherapy for confidence DVDs.

Even if you don’t believe you are in need of such help, building your confidence can help you in innumerable ways such as:

-Becoming more assertive. This will pave the way toward life goals.
-Stopping negative “I can’t do this” thought patterns.
-Job Interviews are easier. Get the job you’ve always wanted, and feel confident you can complete any task.
-Get rid of any underlying inferiority complex. Let the world see the real you.
-Social confidence to date who you like, and not “settling” on someone you don’t.

Self Improvement DVDs: Fear of Flying

The fear of planes and flying can be a debilitating phobia for some people. The inability to board a plane due to morbid and anxious thoughts can prevent families from visiting each other, and can prevent them from their much-needed vacations to exotic locales. How priceless to be able to put a fear of flying behind you, and to soar through the clouds with only positive thoughts.

When scenarios are mentally viewed over and over again, like that of a plane crashing, or plane trouble, the fear becomes innate. So that, when that person with the fear actually boards the plane, the body itself has an anxious, panicky response. It is necessary to undo this deep-rooted fear and unlock new modes of thinking and perspectives.

Self Improvement DVDs: Weight Loss

It affects the majority of Americans. Food. And the inability to control what is put into our mouths. What a joyous day it would be to wake up and feel confident you would not reach for the candy bar or bag of chips halfway through the morning. To have a mental attitude toward shedding those pounds from your body would be a remarkable day indeed.

95% of all diets fail. That is because they need to be long range. While most people can tackle a hurdle of two weeks, a month or even six months, their long range weight loss goal is soon null and void due to binging, and the feeling of overconfidence (now that I’ve lost all this weight, I can go ahead and splurge!). The key to weight loss is mental, and the hypnotherapy dvds will unlock that mental code, much more so than any diet ever could.

Self Improvement DVDS: Becoming a Non Smoker

Cigarettes rule many people’s lives. And evidence of their use is everywhere. Smelling up the car, the house, their clothes, and their hair, even yellowing their teeth. Not to mention aging the skin and overall decreased health.

But nicotine is a strong, addictive drug. How can one stop the cravings? While withdrawal is difficult for everyone, giving in to withdrawal symptoms will never cease the smoking habit. That’s why the hypnotherapy dvds are necessary, to overcome the pull of the nicotine and therefore, eventually, becoming more healthy overall.

By: Wendy Pan

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It says about Noah that he brought the animals to the ark in couples. But there are things which come in triples, like Self-Awareness, Self-Improvement and Self-Empowerment. The three go hand in hand (like a couple). The longer you tread the right path, these three will unite and become ONE.

No wonder all these three concepts begin with SELF. No-one can tread the path for you. You are responsible to doing “the work”, to tread the triple path.

These are “good news”. There can be no Self-Empowerment without Self-Improvement, and none of the two without Self-Awareness. One leads to the other and feed each other at the same time. Therefore, the minute you embark on the path to any of the three, you’re actually embarking on the path to all three together.

What is Self-Awareness?
This is a journey to your inner-self; getting to know and understand yourself better; being honest and true regarding who you are, how you handle your life, how you sabotage yourself and your relationships, how you limit and imprison yourself. It’s realizing which factors affect your emotions, attitudes, reactions and behaviours throughout your life.

What is Self-Improvement?
It’s taking the necessary steps to de-activate the role different factors have exerted over you and prevented you from being “who you really are”. It’s a process of “becoming a better person” in the way you perceive yourself and in the ways you motivate yourself to “do better” in your life (”doing better” according to your definition of its meaning).

What is Self-Empowerment?
It’s your ability to support yourself to do things you haven’t had the courage to do before; it’s becoming more assertive; it’s having a clearer vision of where you want to go (professionally and personally); how you want to get there; which ways you intend to apply in order to succeed and to change whatever you feel needs change.

As you walk this triple path you get closer and closer to becoming whole. In touch with yourself, your needs, fears and desires, strengths as well as weaknesses. You expand your authenticity, your ability to speak out your mind, do what feels right for you and not do what doesn’t feel right (which others want you to do).

The triple SELF is actually one whole

What’s really nice about this process of getting closer to “yourSELF”, is that the minute you embark on the journey to Self-Awareness, Self-Improvement or Self-Empowerment – you have begun a process of improving who you are and the life you have. This will no doubt empower you to have better personal and professional interactions.

To learn more about how to develop Self-Awareness, improve and empower yourself, visit:

http://self-awareness-and-relationships.blogspot.com

By: Doron Gil, Ph.D.

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At present we notice that a man calls in a doctor or visits his chamber whenever he feels unwell. It is some kind of urge that goads him to visit the doctor. The vital reason is he seeks immediate relief and finds the way to happiness. But if we look back we may discern that doctors were called up when any man was in severe condition or was totally confined to bed or groaning in death agony. The socioeconomic factor was not negligible but the more potent reason was that people were callous; they never bothered for heir health. ‘What would be would be’ was the ultimate mantra. But at present through different agonizing experiences man has begun to believe the age old proverb, “Prevention is better than Cure”. Hence whenever he falls sick he never hesitates to visit a doctor to Buy Relief and be Happy at any cost. 

It is a good sign. Anyway you find the Way to Happiness through self improvement. It is not expected that you suffer agony and be whipped by torments all the time. But instead of taking self prescription medications it is better to visit a specialist and offering the fees seek his perfect suggestion. It is good for him as well as the doctor. The patient feels better and finds zest for life. On the other hand the doctor who treats the man has in his hand every detail of his ailments. So if the man falls sick again and visits the doctor for the second time the doctor just casting a glance at the prescriptions makes out where the problem lies and treats the patient accordingly. This is a Way to Happiness.

Again there is a type of person who frequently visits doctors. It may be said quite clearly that he shops doctors. Though his intention is to buy Happiness it is a wrong process. No doctor satisfies him, no doctor offers him cure. He is all the time worried, all the time in a hurry, all the time broods over the medicines and the treatment procedure. Probably he has gone through some books and come to know of some medicines and their indications. But it is not possible for him to know the exact dose, the exact duration; the chemical value of the medicine etc. All can’t be doctors or chemists. The duty rests on some persons who are quite aware of the subjects, who have to prosecute their studies for a handful of years. Hence it is the self improvement to warn people not to waste time in trying to be vain doctors. Let the doctors do their duties. Rather it is better to visit a doctor when he is pained just to Buy Relief tinged with the glow of Happiness.

By: Manidip Bandyopadhyay

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Building your confidence by challenging your comfort zone can be a lot of fun. For many people they get stuck in a rut in life and when that happens you can’t build confidence because you never try anything new.

There are many simple steps you can take that will build your confidence and challenge your comfort zone. Here are 4 steps or exercises you can do this week to build your confidence.

1. Make eye contact. Many people today don’t make eye contact as much as they should, and many people won’t even look at you in the eye, much less your face. A great way to build confidence is by trying to hold eye contact with someone longer than you are used too. This may sound easy but you need to try it. You will find out it is hard to leave your comfort zone, but once you get into the simple habit of holding eye contact longer you will feel more confident.

2. Sitting up front in meetings. Most people sit in the back of every place they go. From classrooms to boardrooms, it seems like people are obsessed with sitting the back of the room. Next time you have to go to a meeting, sit in the front row, get used to sticking out of the crowd. At first when you do this exercise it will seem like everyone is staring at you, but this is good. It gets you out of your comfort zone and will build greater confidence.

3. Speak up more often. Many people at meetings don’t say a word and only speak when spoken to. This exercise is another great way to get out of your comfort zone. Nothing makes you feel more vulnerable than putting your personal ideas on the table for discussion.

4. Smile big. This is one of my personal favorite confidence building techniques. Not only do you feel better when you smile, but people will start to wonder what is going on with you. Not only will you stand out by doing this, people will start to talk about why you are smiling all the time. No one needs to know the real reason, just you!

These four exercises are all simple to do but will build your confidence. Once you try these exercises to challenge your comfort zone you will feel your confidence growing automatically.

By: Luke Blaise

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I suffered from low self confidence for many years. It’s takes deep courage to overcome it. There are various ways to help with building up your self confidence or overcoming shyness. These are a few methods that work really well.

Self Confidence Audio Programs

This is an extremely effective method. We all have busy schedules and not much time to spend on self improvement. This is why audio programs are so brilliant. We are able to listen to tapes while commuting to work. This time would be otherwise wasted doing nothing. For the more visually stimulated person, you could make use of the numerous DVDs and videos on sale. Spending just a little time everyday to improve yourself will soon pay off.

Self Improvement E-books

There have been many self-help books written over the years and many of these have been converted into e-books for easy viewing. These are generally inexpensive to acquire. There are also many new titles being published regularly with updated information for the modern age. This type of media is accessible to more people than any other. E-books are always readily available for purchase and can be instantly downloaded and used.

Self Confidence Coaching

Some of the most successful people in the world have benefited from personal coaching. This method an be highly successful though not everyone can afford to hire a personal coach. These mentors usually hold workshops or seminars to address a larger congregation of people. You may be surprised at how uplifting these seminars can be.

By: Gregory Timson

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Recently a woman said to me “I feel so withered”. I was puzzled as to what she meant by withered. She proceeded to recount that she felt that her life had become so predictable, repetitive, and rather dull. Both her job and her marriage were OK but neither was challenging or exciting. She added that she also felt withered because she had neglected her body. What upset her the most was that she used to be such a happy person with many interests and lots of energy.

I had heard similar expressions from other men and women in their second half of life. Although no one else had referred to what was happening as “withering away”. Yet the meaning was the same.

How do you recharge yourself? The key for making changes is to begin by thinking differently and by taking action.

1. Believe that you can make changes

By truly believing that change is possible throughout life we free ourselves up for growth. Just like plants need to be constantly nurtured to thrive so do people. If we don’t have new challenges from the outside or create new goals for ourselves on the inside we indeed begin to wither. It is a human need that we create our lives to be what we deep inside know we are capable of being.

2. Be in it for the long haul

We all are creatures of habit. When we do something over and over it becomes a habit. To change habits you have to consciously keep in mind what you want to change and begin with little steps. Lasting change takes persistence and after a while you will develop new habits.

3. Grow yourself throughout life

Do things as long as you enjoy them. When boredom sets on ask yourself what you need to to do to make the task or situation more interesting. For instance couples need to keep nurturing their relationship otherwise the relationship looses vibrancy and will be fueled primarily by the stresses of living. Likewise, there needs to be a chance to grow and be challenged at work because otherwise the mind becomes dulled. One of the characteristics of the second half of life is a renewed longing for life to have meaning and purpose. Value your inner voice because it is encouraging you to bring forth your authentic self.

4. Take action

The most important thing to do is to get started. For instance,if you want more energy for yourself review your eating habits. Are you eating things that fuel you or are you indulging in energy zappers? You can make a conscious decision to drink more water instead of sodas. It has to be conscious and specific. You can say to yourself ” I will drink one soda a day and substitute water all the other times”. That decision has to be followed daily and before you know it you will have developed a new healthier habit.

Look at life as a journey. You are the orchestrator of your journey. If you are on a path that doesn’t give you the satisfaction you desire then find a new path. Enjoy the process since it may take you in directions you have yet to imagine.

By: Kristina Von Rosenvinge

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